Three migrants found dead off southern Spain

Three migrants were found dead on a boat off the coast of southern Spain, and twenty-nine were rescued, the Spanish coast guard announced on Sunday, October 13, a few days after a shipwreck that killed more than fifty dead or missing. The rubber dinghy was off the coast of Almeria, Andalusia, where the “twenty-nine North African men” rescued, and the bodies of the deceased, a maritime rescue spokesperson told Agence France-Presse.

Two weeks ago, a boat carrying migrants capsized off the coast of Spain’s Canary Islands. Twenty-seven people had been rescued, nine bodies found, but as the boat was probably carrying some 90 people, the presumed number of missing and dead exceeds fifty. This is the heaviest death toll off the coast of the Canary Islands in three decades of migration from Africa.

This tragedy reveals the sharp increase in migrant arrivals in Spain by sea. There were 40,076 between January and September, 56% more than during the same period of 2023 (25,640), according to the Ministry of the Interior. Three quarters arrived by the Atlantic towards the Canary Islands, a particularly dangerous route due to strong currents, to which is added the unsuitability for the high seas of the boats used.

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During the first five months of 2024, more than 5,000 migrants died trying to reach Spain by sea, according to the NGO Caminando Fronteras, which assesses the number of victims based on the testimonies of survivors.

The World with AFP

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